The Gentleman's Club

Phillips Cycles Ltd of Smethwick, Birmingham decided to
introduce their first Gadabout model P39, fitted with a 2-gear Rex
engine, in November 1955 at the Earls Court Show. This wasn't to
work out as particularly opportune timing however, as several other
British manufacturers, also with hungry eyes on the moped market,
appeared at the same event with their own offerings. Striking and
original engineering creations from Hercules with the Grey Wolf, and
Mercury's Mercette would obviously draw the limelight (but not many
customers it seemed), while Norman debuted the brilliantly named Nippy,
and Bown their less well chosen Bambi 50 (the Bambi title was very
quickly dropped). The UK competition and continental importers
seemed more successful in the scramble to grab free show publicity, and
Phillips subsequently found their new machine with barely a mention in
the press. In October 1956 an elegant 10-pint 'teardrop' tank
replaced the original 7-pint 'bubble'. Then as the Villiers 3K
2-gear moped engine started to reach the market by July 1959, this
succeeded the German motor, and resulted in the model P45. It
wasn't all over for the Rex installation however as a new 3-gear unit
became available and offered the opportunity for Phillips to add a new
flagship to their range, designated the P50 Deluxe 3.

Initially these were painted in the same Royal Carmine Red that
characterised both Norman and Phillips machines of the time, but this
colour was quickly superseded by a classy paint job in black and ivory
with gold lining to set it visually apart from the basic model.

The new motor wasn't simply a 3-speed version of the old 2-gear
unit, but featured new, smooth crankcases devoid of the radial finning
on the earlier castings. The clutch cover was also restyled to
iron out some of the lumpy bits, and resulted in a width increase of
about 11/2". The other working parts, crank, clutch, piston,
steel lined aluminium barrel and cylinder head remained common, but a
Bing unit replaced the Pallas carburettor. Power output was still
rated at 2.1bhp @ 6,000rpm, but became much more usable as a result of
the spacing from the extra gear, and benefited slightly from the 4% top
ratio increase from 14.9 to 13.5:1. Visually the engine exuded
quality and looked a real credit to its designer.

Phillips always remained traditional in staying faithful to their
own rigid frame, while judging by their construction, the Gadabout
inverted telescopic forks are most unorthodox and must have been the
product of a former steam engineer. Outwardly they appear
conventional enough, but above the tubular bottom sections, the legs
become hexagonal in form and run in cast bronze top bushes broached
through to a matching hexagonal bore! The top greasing points
screw through the legs directly into the bushes to inject lubricant
straight into the upper working part. The lack of seals to the
sliding leg suggests the designer expected the proud Gadabout owner to
always be diligent with lubrication schedules to preclude dirt
entry-now back to planet Earth after that brief flirtation with
unreality! Every Gadabout I've ever seen has completely worn out
bottom bushes, which fortunately are round (unlike the top set), and
can easily be remade. It's something of a relief that the
contaminated grease never travels up far enough to erode the top
bushes, since machining out six-sided holes could present quite a
complication.

Another puzzle is how to adjust the saddle height? Search the
frame all you like, in the toolbox, under the frame, but there are just
no clamps anywhere to fix the stem-it's as if it's held up by
magic! The conjurer's secret is only exposed by removing the
seat. I can't recall a handlebar stem adjuster used on a seat
stem on anything else I've ever seen before, but it seems to work fine,
and the frame looks so much cleaner without the traditional stem
clamp. Attention to detail you see!

The British Hub Co brakes are operated by back pedal to the rear,
which gives excellent performance and can easily be made to lock up the
wheel under excessive pressure. The twist change situated on the
left bar features a most unconventional addition-pre-select
gears! Properly set up, this precisely locates the gear before
you've let out the clutch, to provide a perfect crunch-free
shift. This appreciably contributes to the operational impression
of quality, but this mechanism will also automatically block the rider
shifting beyond one position at a time, and physically prevent you
going from 3rd straight to neutral or through into 1st. This
situation is overcome by an additional thumb operated override lever
under the twist-grip, but its operation never really comes naturally
and you are only reminded to use it after first finding yourself
battling against the change.

Now with all the controls sorted out, would sir care to take our
latest model for a ride? Thank you Mr Phillips; don't mind if I
do! The decompressor trigger gets the motor spinning much more
easily than similar machines without such a considerate facility, and
the trigger choke readily fires up the engine without the need to reach
down and fiddle with nasty petroily bits-all very civilised. A
couple more flicks on the choke and the motor very quickly settles down
to a steady tick-over beat, so the whole outfit feels really good
before you've even pulled off! Getting away reveals a nice clutch
with clean shifts and a steady urge right up through the gears on
ideally spaced ratios. The bike is light and nimble, but reminds
you its conservative design isn't intended to be scratched around
corners by fairly readily scraping the centre stand, though this does
establish the handling as sure footed up to its intended limit.
The exhaust note gives a pleasantly powerful and regular beat broken by
a loud induction draw under throttle through the unducted filter on the
back of the carb. Despite the confident impression of power this
may give, in this case it can become a little tiring on longer runs
since this is actually not a sports machine. The P50 is
consistently strong throughout its range but was never intended to work
at revs, and is most comfortable cruising steadily. The VDO
speedo tops out between 35 & 40mph according to best conditions,
but it's so pleasant in top gear around 25mph that you generally settle
down around this natural speed.

The Phillips Gadabout Deluxe 3 is simply a superb quality ride, not
fast, but it doesn't need to be-it's got class. The Gentleman's
Club of old mopeds!

The Raleigh Group's decision to factor branded Motobécane
products for the 1962 season meant that the P50 was actually produced
for barely two years-it deserved much more! If circumstances
could have been different and the Gadabout naturally developed with
rear suspension, it may well have gone on for a long time as a fine
machine. Sadly the Phillips brand name became another casualty of
group rationalisation, and had disappeared from the manufacturer's
lists by 1964.

All the Phillips Gadabouts are really nice quality British brand
machines, inexplicably unappreciated and ridiculously
undervalued. The P50 was surely the finest of these, however it
wasn't the last Gadabout. That honour went to a completely
different factored machine that wore the Phillips logo for the final
time. Labelled under various badges and in several forms, this
machine went on to become developed over nearly 20 years of continuous
production and surely rank as one of the greatest mopeds of all
time-but the Gadabout Mk IV model PM2 is the
start of another story!